Country-level characteristics, organizations and ICT adoption: an in-depth study in the publishing...

Country-level characteristics, organizations and ICT adoption:

an in-depth study in the publishing industry

Gianvito Lanzolla & Fernando SuarezCass Business School & Boston University

Agenda

• Research focus• Methodology• Results• Policy implications

Gianvito Lanzolla Cass Business School

Research focus

To study the relationship between country-level characteristics and ICT adoption within organizations


Studying ICT adoption: methodological issues

• ICT adoptionDefining and capturing ICT adoption

• Independent variable– Firm-level characteristics– Organizational environment

• Functional form & Causality

ICT adoption =

f(firm-level characteristics, ...., organizational environment)


ICT adoption

• ICT breakdown (What)– e.g. in which technologies and for which

processes organizations allocate their ICT budget, what organizations adopt

• ICT adoption process (How)– e.g. how organizations implement ICTs,

how organization adopt

• ICT adoption timing (When)– e.g. timing in ICTs implementation


Organizational environment

• Firm’s ecosystem – e.g. a firm’s network of business relationships, local environment, etc.

• Industry characteristics – e.g. service vs. manufacturing industries

• Country-level characteristics – e.g. institutional form, market structures, general infrastructures, etc.


Organizational characteristics

• IT managerial capabilities (Mata et al., 1995; Sambamurthy and Zmud, 1992)

• IT skills (Katz, 1974; Ross et al., 1996)

• A firm’s absorptive capacity (Cohen & Levinthal, 1990)

• Technology readiness (Davis and Bagozzi, 1989)

• “Complementary workplace organization” and resources (Bresnahan et al., 2002; Clemons and Row 1991)


Methods

• Comparative study across 5 countries– UK, US, Italy, China, Brazil

• In-depth study on a single industry (publishing) based on primary data (survey) – cross sectional study

• Integrative, theory-driven methodology to measure organizational characteristics


Sample

• China– 53 returned questionnaires

• “G8” countries (US, UK and Italy)– 30 returned questionnaires

• Brazil– 60 retuned questionnaires!


Measures

• ICT adoption patterns– Breakdown by ICT functionalities, Breakdown by ICT

technical features, implementation process, adoption timing

• Country-level characterises– GDP/capita

• Organizational characteristics– Age, Size, Organizational Complexity, Organizational Form

(state controlled or privately controlled)


(1) Breakdown by ICT functionalities

Breakdown by ICT functionalities

Primary Activities

Secondary Activities

Operations Management

Administrative processesProcurement

Marketing & Sales


Breakdown by ICT functionalities: Results

1. Emerging countries allocate proportionally more resources in ICTs to support secondary activities than “G8” countries

2. There is no significant country-level effect in resource allocation in primary activities

(After controlling for organizational level characteristics)

% of ICT budget allocated to support administrative processes

0

5

10

15

20

25

China US


(2) Breakdown by ICT technical features

• Communication infrastructures• Application software• Internet oriented software• Software maintenance• Integrations solutions


(2) Breakdown by ICT technical features: Results

1. Emerging Countries allocate proportionally more resources in communication infrastructures than “G8” countries

2. No significant country-level differences are found for the other technical features

(After controlling for firm level characteristics)

% of ICT budget allocated in communication infrastructures

34

36

38

40

42

44

46

China G8


ICT implementation process

• Learning process that enable the organization to make cognitive, interpersonal, and organizational adjustments that allow new routines to become ongoing practice (Edmondson, Bohmer and Pisano, 2001)

– Project manager authority– ICT project endorsement– Reward and motivation system


ICT implementation process: Results

1. In G8 countries, project managers benefit from higher authority

2. In G8 Countries the level of ICT projects endorsement is higher

3. No statistically significant differences for country level characteristics in team rewards systems(After controlling for firm level characteristics)

0

0.5

1

1.5

2

2.5

China G8 China G8

Endorsement Project manager authority

(4) ICT adoption timing

• Centralized computing• LAN• Web Servers


(4) ICT adoption timing: Results

1. G8 countries have been earlier adopters of LAN and centralized computing (cc)

2. There seem to be no country-level effect in web server adoption timing

(After controlling for firm level characteristics)

1990

1991

1992

1993

1994

1995

1996

1997

1998

1999

2000

China G8 China G8 China G8

CC LAN Web


Policy implications

• Country-level characteristics still trigger significant differences in what, how and when organizations adopt ICTs

• ICT policies may need to be country specific – ICT policies are not totally transferable from one country to

another, – Emerging countries countries need to find their “own” policies.

• For instance, in “emerging countries”, policies to help firms improve ICT implementation should be considered – The implementation process is crucial for the successful use

of new technologies


Country-level characteristics, organizations and ICT adoption: an in-depth study in the publishing...

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